This invention relates to a refrigeration unit having a high efficiency heat reclaiming cycle operatively associated therewith.
It has long been recognized that a mechanical vapor compression refrigeration system, relying on the reversed Carnot cycle, inherently rejects a relatively large amount of energy (heat) during the condensing phase of the cycle. Normally, this rejected energy is wasted. Efforts directed toward recovering this wasted energy in a usable form have heretofore proven to be generally unsatisfactory. For the most part, these efforts involve complex and costly equipment which cannot be readily implemented for use in existing refrigeration machines. Furthermore, in most prior art heating and cooling systems, the refrigeration condenser is required to meet the simultaneous demands imposed on the system by both the heating and cooling circuits. These demands are rarely mutually compatible and the efficient operation of one circuit typically must be sacrificed for the benefit of the other. That is to say, when both the heating and cooling circuits are required to share a common condenser, the condenser must be called upon to serve the peak demand imposed by one circuit while the other is forced to dependently follow. As a consequence, the overall operating efficiency of the system is adversely effected and, rather than conserving energy, which is the primary objective in heat reclaiming, the total system performance may, in fact, prove to be energy consuming.